The poster is hanging in the corridor: “Mistakes are learning opportunities.” The CEO said it in the town hall: “We need a culture where mistakes are allowed.” HR has set up a workshop programme.
Six months later: Nobody admits mistakes. Problems are hidden until they can no longer be concealed. Blame starts as soon as something goes wrong. The posters are still there, but they have become an irony.
A culture of error cannot be mandated. It emerges through leadership behaviour—or it doesn’t. Most “culture of error” initiatives fail because they pull the wrong lever: they try to change culture without changing the behaviour that creates culture.
A managing director I advised launched a “culture of error initiative” with everything that goes with it: posters, workshops, a new chapter in the mission statement. After a year, she asked me for an honest assessment. My question was simple: “When was the last time you admitted your own mistake in a board meeting?” Long silence. That was the diagnosis.
Announcing that mistakes are now allowed changes nothing. Four mechanisms prevent it.
Words are cheaper than consequences. People watch what happens, not what is said. If the first person to admit a mistake is publicly criticised, the organisation has sent its real message. No amount of posters can overwrite that.
Trust has to be earned. Years of blame and consequences for mistakes cannot be erased with an announcement. People need repeated experiences that it is safe to admit mistakes. That takes time and requires consistency.
Reward systems send different signals. Who gets promoted? Who gets praised? If the answer is “those who don’t make mistakes” or, worse, “those who hide mistakes best,” then the real culture is clear. Official statements do not change that.
Managers model the opposite. Many managers demand tolerance for mistakes from others, but do not admit mistakes themselves. This discrepancy is toxic. It signals: admitting mistakes is for others, not for me.
The question is not what you say about mistakes. The question is what happens when one is made.
A common misunderstanding: a culture of error means everything is allowed. The opposite is true.
Not all mistakes are the same. There is a fundamental difference between mistakes caused by negligence or indifference, mistakes made despite the best intentions and appropriate care, and mistakes made in calculated risks and experiments. A mature culture of error distinguishes between these categories. It tolerates the latter two, but not the first.
| Tolerate | Do not tolerate |
|---|---|
| Mistakes in experiments | Mistakes due to negligence |
| Mistakes despite due care | Repeated identical mistakes |
| Mistakes that are reported | Mistakes that are covered up |
| Mistakes that are learned from | Mistakes that are ignored |
Standards remain important. A culture of error does not mean quality does not matter. It means people can feel safe reporting mistakes without fear of punishment, so they can be corrected before they escalate. And repeated mistakes are a different issue: making a mistake is human. Making the same mistake repeatedly is a performance issue.
A genuine culture of error is not the opposite of excellence. It is a prerequisite for it.
Amy Edmondson of Harvard Business School coined the term “psychological safety” and demonstrated in extensive studies: teams with high psychological safety perform better because problems are identified and addressed earlier. Psychological safety describes the belief that you can take risks without being punished or humiliated.
In concrete terms, this means: asking questions without being seen as incompetent. Admitting mistakes without fear of retaliation. Contributing ideas without being laughed at. Raising concerns without being labelled a blocker. What it does not mean: that everyone is always nice to each other, that there are no standards, that performance does not matter, or that criticism is avoided. Psychological safety and high performance standards are not a contradiction.
A department head told me: “In a meeting, I said our pilot project had failed. Afterwards, my boss called me into the corridor and asked whether I was out of my mind to admit that in front of the board. From that day on, I only reported successes.” That one reaction undid years of work on a culture of error.
People do not hide mistakes out of malice. They hide them because it feels safer than admitting them.
A culture of error does not start with employees. It starts with leadership. And it does not start with words, but with behaviour. Three levers are decisive.
Admit your own mistakes and respond appropriately to reports. Not as a theatrical gesture, but as normal practice. “I misjudged that” or “I made a mistake here,” said by a manager, normalises admitting mistakes for everyone. And the moment someone reports a mistake is decisive. The first reaction shapes everything that follows. If you respond with accusations, you will not receive any more error reports. If you respond with “Thank you for raising this,” you open the door. Do not shoot the messenger: in many organisations, the person who names the problem suddenly becomes responsible for the solution or is associated with the problem. That must stop. And ask “What happened?” instead of “Who is to blame?” This shift in perspective changes everything.
Learn from mistakes systematically. Structured follow-up after significant mistakes: What happened? Why? What can we change? Asking these questions systematically makes learning routine. Look for causes rather than symptoms: the obvious cause is rarely the real one. Why was the deadline missed? Because the employee was too slow? Or because requirements were unclear, resources were missing, and three other projects were running in parallel? Identify system errors: most mistakes are symptoms of system problems—unclear processes, missing resources, conflicting incentives. And share insights: what one team learns is often relevant to others. But knowledge does not flow by itself. Do not wait until it is too late. Run a pre-mortem before important projects: act as if the initiative has failed and ask what went wrong. This exercise surfaces risks before they occur and normalises talking about potential mistakes.
Set consequences correctly. Natural consequences work: most people want to do good work. Making a mistake and seeing the outcome is already a consequence. Set consequences for behaviour, not for outcomes: there is a difference between someone working carefully and a mistake still happening, and someone being negligent. And if there are to be consequences, then for hiding mistakes, not for making them. This reversal sends a strong signal: mistakes happen; covering yourself and covering up are unacceptable. Escalate if it happens again: a mistake is a learning opportunity. The same mistake for the third time is a different matter. A clear conversation is appropriate here.
How can you tell whether the official culture of error matches what is actually lived?
| What you observe | What it means |
|---|---|
| Problems become visible late, only once they have escalated | People hide mistakes; lack of safety |
| Blame dominates meetings | Nothing has changed, regardless of what the posters say |
| Nobody says “I don’t know” | People do not dare to admit they don’t know |
| Only successes in reports; failures are invisible | The culture is not yet where it should be |
| Managers never admit mistakes | You have a role-model problem |
The most valuable insights come from mistakes—but only if we analyse them instead of hiding them.
Take five minutes and answer three questions honestly:
First: When was the last time you publicly admitted your own mistake, and what happened afterwards?
Second: Do you learn about problems early enough to respond, or only once they have escalated?
Third: Would your employees say it is safe to admit mistakes when you are not in the room?
If you are unsure about the third question, do not ask your managers. Ask the employees.
Most “culture of error” initiatives do not fail due to a lack of will. They fail due to a lack of consistency—due to the gap between what is said and what is lived.
A culture of error is not a project with a beginning and an end. It is a daily practice. Every response to a mistake shapes it. Every leadership behaviour shapes it. Every act of blame damages it. The organisations with the best culture of error are not those with the best programmes. They are the ones where managers admit their own mistakes, where problems are raised early, and where learning matters more than blame.
It does not start with a poster. It starts with you. The next time a mistake is brought to you, respond with a single question: “What can we learn from this?” And observe what happens.
Breaking the culture of self-protection – A culture of error and a culture of self-protection are two sides of the same coin. Where mistakes are punished, everyone protects themselves.
The culture you didn’t order – What is written on the wall and what actually happens after a mistake are often two different things.
All Insights can be found in the overview.
Proven tools and models for self-application are available under Solutions.
If you want to take these thoughts further for your company, a no-obligation initial conversation is worthwhile.
